1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the art of electrical connectors, and more particularly to a land grid array (LGA) connector with terminal receiving holes for facilitating inspection of terminals.
2. General Background
Various types of connectors have been developed for electrical connections to an IC package and a printed circuit board, such as Pin Grid Array (PGA) connectors, Ball Grid Array (BGA) connectors, Land Grid Array (LGA) connectors, etc., the names of which are assigned thereto based on conductive elements of the IC package that connectors electrically connect. Contacts resided within the respective connectors are accordingly classified as PGA contacts, BGA contacts, LGA contacts and so on.
As shown in FIG. 5, a conventional LGA connector generally includes a housing 6 with a plurality of passageways 60 extending therethrough, and terminals 50 adapted to be retained in the respective passageways 60 of the housing 6. Each of the terminals 50 has a mounting portion 56 extending toward a mounting surface of the housing 6, which is adapted to face a printed circuit board (not shown).
A problem, however, with the connector terminal 50 is that mechanical characteristics of the connector terminal 50, such as co-planarity of each of the terminal 50 with respect to the mounting surface of the housing 6, uniformity of metal material used to plate with the terminal mounting portion 56, etc., are not easily inspected by inspection beams emitted by a light 40. This is so because a distance, designated as “C”, between an outer edge of the mounting portion 56 and a corresponding sidewall of the housing 6 is limited, and thus the light beam, to be entering, is obstructed. This will affect the inspection accuracy of the connector terminal 50. In addition, for some instances, the connector terminals 50 are prone to be damaged during insertion of the terminals 50 into the respective passageways 60 of the housing 6, due to portions of the terminals 50 along an insertion direction being easily crashed against walls of the housing 6 adjacent the corresponding passageways 60.